Posted in Hair, Hair Archive | Friday, January 22nd, 2010
In a nutshell, if you’re “no-poo” it means that you don’t use shampoo to wash your hair. If you’re “low-poo” it means you only shampoo once a month or so. I don’t have relaxed hair now, but growing up I always washed my relaxed and pressed hair once a week and that was the ONLY water I was allowed to expose my hair to. (Water is like kryptonite to a girl with relaxed hair LOL!)
Naturally curly hair is different. Natural curls NEED WATER. It loves the stuff, but the curls and bends in the hair make it more fragile than straight hair and harder to clean out silicones and their residue surfactants leave behind. (I covered more silicones and surfactants in Why I don’t Shampoo my Hair Part. 1) These bends and curls can also easily break and knot.
If you have curly hair, have you ever noticed that RIGHT before your due for a wash your hair looks great? I think that’s because it’s takes most of the week to get the crusty surfactants out of your hair. Stylist Lorraine Massey thought so too, and she wrote a little book called “Curly Girl, the Handbook”. The terms “no-poo” and “low-poo” were both her inventions and the no poo method has taken the world by storm because not only are sulfates harmful to your hair, they’re also harmful to the lakes, rivers and streams that water waste runs off into. (Ever notice how some lakes and rivers seem to have dirty soap bubbles on the surface? Surfactants again)
She also coined another term “co-wash” which stands for “conditioner-only wash”, which basically means you wash your hair with conditioner instead of shampoo. This sounds weird until you compare the ingredients in shampoo to those of conditioner and see how similiar they are. Conditioners just don’t have sulfates (so it won’t bubble up) and they have more emollients and oils.
The “Curly Girl Program” goes like this.
1. Wet your hair thoroughly in the shower WITHOUT touching it
2. Then you take a little sulfate-free conditioner, rub your hand together and clean your scalp GENTLY
3. Take some more conditioner and pull it through you hair, which if wet enough you should be able to detangle with your fingers
4. make sure conditioner is all through your hair, and then rinse well
5. Use a hand towel to scrunch your hair up towards your scalp and get rid of excess water
6. Pull a CLEAR gel through your curls carefully
6. Air dry or use a diffuser on a hand dryer and “hand-scrunch” as you go
You can do this method everyday if you have 2a,2b, or 3a curls. (More on what those numbers mean here). I myself do this method a lot during the summer. But my 4a/4b tight coils can still take 12 hours to dry.
For more on Curly Girl, check out Lorraine Massey’s book.
In Part 3 of this series, I’ll show you my routine and how I tweaked the no-poo regimen a bit to suit my needs, my hair and my schedule.
Do you “no-poo” or “low-poo”? What’s your routine?
About Savvy Brown
I believe being healthy doesn't have to be complicated, being green can be easy and being broke isn't an option!
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Love the info describing and identifying levels of curliness! I am a 3C and I do the co-washing once every 4 – 5 days depending on how I’ve slept the nite before! I low-poo, only once every 2 weeks. I’d like to do start doing less since I also heard that some ingredients in shampoo are damaging to the body. I do find that diffusing while my head is upside down gives me more body and better curl pattern. I love Mixed Chicks brand (even for people who are not mixed). They’re deep condition is great and the leave-in is amazing. Thanks for this great blog! ~Baraka Bashad~
I’m glad you like it! Yes many ingredients in shampoo are harmful to your health. (check out my previous post under Health called “My Health Turning Point” I’m going to have to try “upside down diffusion” and see what it does to my 4a/4b hair.
Hey Savvy I have been searching your blog for a link that I think you posted. It was a link to a site that rates the toxicity of products. Can you help a sistah out on this?!?! Thanks
Marissa
Hi Marrissa! I think you’re either referring to the video I linked to in this article My Health Turning Point or the list in Why I don’t Shampoo My Hair Pt. 1 or A Better Way to Clean Hope that helps! If not, email me at savvy@savvybrown.com and I’ll try and figure it out.
I poo with Dr Bronners Liquid Castille soap, very well diluted about every 2 weeks. I perfer Natures Gate Jojoba conditioner and I sometimes cleanse my scalp with it alone when I need a quick style change.
I have finished my 30 day “no shampoo” experiment. I must say this experiment wasn’t enjoyable. My hair became a blizzard when I ran my hand through it. The flakes in my hair became nearly the size of cornflakes. My head was constantly itchy and I could barely have sex, read, or sleep. I felt like a disgusting scumball.
A few days ago, however, I noticed my scalp starting improving. My dandruff did not disappear, but became more patchy. Since I was finished with the experiment and discovered that I have dandruff whether I use or don’t use shampoo, I decided to start using shampoo again. Basically I found that if I don’t use shampoo, I save money and have dandruff. If I use shampoo, I spend money and have dandruff, but I feel cleaner and have more self-esteem.
My skin is sensitive to cold temperatures, but I personally wouldn’t advise anyone to give up on shampoo. Companies make shampoo because it’s better than nothing. I learned my lesson. This past month was torture for me.
@student I’m sorry that it was such an unpleasurable experience for you! What, may I ask, did you use to clean your scalp with instead of shampoo? I too tend to have dry scalp, and I’ve found that using a sulfate-free shampoo helps. So does washing my hair in sections and concentrating more on my scalp than my hair. I think what’s more important that getting rid of shampoo altogether is using one that is sulfate-free. Check out some of the sulfate-free shampoos here, they may work better for you. Let me know how it goes and thanks for sharing your story!
I washed my hair just using plain water. I am using anti-dandruff shampoos
now. My scalp is better, but my face is really dry. I think the weather has been too cold and dry recently.
@student Ahh. I see, probably when the water evaporated it left your scalp really dry. Most “no-poo” methods suggest using your conditioner as a shampoo instead of nothing at all. Be careful with the anti-dandruff shampoos they tend to have a bunch of chemicals in them that are harmful for your skin. Maybe when your scalp calms down a bit, you could try using a sulfate-free shampoo? Your face is drying out because, well, the dandruff shampoo is getting on your face when you wash your hair. Try using a moisturizing cleanser on your face right after you wash your hair. Or maybe moisturize with a drops or two of Organic Rosehip Seed Oil. And don’t forget to drink lots of water, and cut back on citrus fruits in the winter as well!
HTH!